Category: Salads

During Lent or if you just try to limit meat on your table, you may like to try this easy and healthy bread spread – Smoked Mackerel and Farmers Cheese Salad. Actually you can use any other smoked fish, if mackerel is not available in your area. I am using mackerel, because it is the cheapest and the most popular smoked fish available on Polish market. It have been always widely used by our Grandmas trying to feed large family on budget. Mackerel is a fat fish, soft and delicate.

Delicious vegetarian Millet Stuffed Peppers are a staple in my house. In fall months peppers are cheap, so I buy them often and serve them fresh and baked. This time I had them stuffed with vegetables and millet. I cook seasonally and locally.

It is the middle of the Summer, fortunately in Poland you can still buy young spring cabbage. The taste and texture is delicate and sweet, exceptional:) Yesterday I bought one on a local market, I paid 7 PLN, which is about 2 USD. I prepare Young cabbage salad according to the directions of my sister:)

Ogórki małosolne

This is a classic of Polish seasonal cuisine:) Fresh and healthy Polish half sour fermented cucumbers are easy to prepare and delicious. Once you try them – you’ll love them.

Małosolne often accompany vodka and herring with onion on old style meetings:) During PRL you were not supposed to buy only vodka in restaurants, you had to buy also some kind of appetizer, herring and pickled or fermented cucumbers were the most popular:)

Polish Gyros Salad is very popular on parties in Poland, it is easy to prepare and delicious. It’s name comes from very popular seasoning used here to marinate the meat- Gyros, which is a mix of garlic, coriander seeds, charloc, sweet pepper, fenugreek, chilli pepper, rosemary, oregano, thyme and black pepper.

This is a piece of Polish contemporary cuisine, not traditional one, still- worth to try, as it is delicious:)

I remember from my childhood that Polish vegetable salad was a must for each Easter, Christmas, birthday and – very popular those times in Poland – name day. In the 80-ties mayonnaise was hard to get in stores, so we used to prepare it at home.

I still can’t imagine Easter with a family without vegetable salad. Polish vegetable salad is nice to have with cold sliced meets and Beets and Horseradish Salad.

First vegetables available in spring- horseradish and spring onions are the basis of my favorite Polish spring cottage cheese. I use both horseradish balls and sprouts. Sprouts are rich in minerals and can be easily grown at home.

In Poland we use dry write cheese – Twaróg. It is easy available in each grocery store in Poland. My Grandma was sometimes making curd herself, using fresh milk from her neighbour, who has cows.

Pesto z czosnku niedźwiedziego

Bear’s Garlic Pesto is a great Spring fresh dish – healthy and easy to make. This is an early Spring and only now you can get bear’s garlic (also called ramps or wild leek). It grows in forests, but it’s quite hard to find it over there. In Poland in is also partially protected. That’s why I got mine ramps from my friend’s garden, where I seated it few years ago. Thanks Agnieszka for this 0,5 square meter land tenancy:)

Bear’s garlic should be obtained from a trusted source, as it looks similar to lily of the valley, which leaves are poisonous. Check twice before you eat something that is growing wild, it can be dangerous!

One thing that can help you to recognize bear’s garlic is it’s smell – yes! it smells like garlic:)

This herring salad has few layers of ingredients with herring on the bottom of it, that is why it is usually called Herring under a blanket. This is one of my favorite herring dishes for Christmas Eve and Christmas.